Giovanni Trapattoni did not enjoy great success at major tournaments during his spell in charge of Italy. Photograph: Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images

Through Giovanni Trapattoni's passion for football flows a living history of the game that continues on when he leads the Republic of Ireland at Euro 2012. The boy from Cusano Milanino grew up to play against Pelé, Eusébio and Johan Cruyff and at the 1960 Olympics and 1962 World Cup for Italy, with Gianni Rivera at Milan – winning the European Cup twice – before managing clubs to 10 league titles in four different countries. In 1985, Trapattoni had unwanted involvement in one of the sport's lowest points when 39 supporters died at Heysel Stadium, before his Juventus team defeated Liverpool 1-0 to win the European Cup. The roll call of modern day greats who graced his sides include Juventus's Michel Platini, Paolo Rossi and Zbigniew Boniek, and Internazionale's Jürgen Klinsmann, Andreas Brehme and Lothar Matthäus.

Now the 73-year-old Il Trap embarks on his latest adventure. Kevin Kilbane, a BBC pundit who has 110 caps and played under him as recently as last year, says of Trapattoni's achievement in leading Ireland to a first major tournament since 2002: "When he came in four years ago we were off the back of Steve Staunton and we'd had a bad couple of campaigns really, with him, and Brian Kerr after Mick McCarthy left [in November 2002]. Everybody is full of confidence when they play for him because everybody knows what he wants. We're never going to be adventurous – hopefully we've got enough to win games from the odd goal, which we've done."

In 10 qualifiers Ireland lost once, conceded seven times and scored only 15 as a core of Shay Given, John O'Shea, Richard Dunne, Damien Duff and Robbie Keane amassed 21 points to finish second behind Russia in Group B. However they fare in a tough opening round in Poland and Ukraine – which starts on Sunday against Croatia ("We need something from that," says Kilbane) takes in the holders and world champions, Spain (14 June), before finishing with Trapattoni's native Italy (18 June) – he will mastermind the 2014 World Cup qualification campaign. And, for a reduced fee. "He started off on €2m (£1.6m) for the 2008-09 World Cup qualifiers, then in 2010 went to €1.6m, and he's agreed to take a further cut after the Euros, to €1.2m," says a source close to Trapattoni.

Money long ago passed being motivation for the former Milan and Italy stopper who once outmuscled the world's greatest player, a performance of which Rivera says: "When he played against Pelé in the 1963 Intercontinental Cup against Santos, Trapattoni dominated and allowed our 4-2 victory." This came in the opening leg at San Siro of the clash between the European and South American club champions. Trapattoni's Milan had defeated Eusébio's Benfica 2-1 at Wembley to become Italy's inaugural European Cup winners. Six years later he was integral again to a second triumph, when Cruyff's Ajax were beaten 4-1 in Madrid.

Rivera adds: "All the coaches asked him to mark the opposing player who was vital – Trapattoni was a decisive factor against Pelé, Eusébio, and Cruyff."

The football lineage that runs through Trapattoni also includes the Battle of Santiago, as Italy's violent 2-0 defeat to Chile at the 1962 World Cup became known. His team-mates Giorgio Ferrini and Mario David were sent off by Ken Aston, the English referee who ignored countless other acts of aggression. "I don't keep special memories of that time. Giovanni also doesn't believe we did ourselves justice," Rivera recalls of a campaign that foundered at the group stage.

Trapattoni can be proud of a playing career that ran from 1959-1971 at Milan before he finished following a single season at Varese. But what ensued was better: Italian managerial history's most successful club career. Rivera says: "We all thought he had the ability to become an excellent coach – the great determination he had playing he's maintained as a manager."

Trapattoni's haul is 10 championships – one each in Austria, Portugal and Germany plus seven in Italy – three Uefa Cups, one Cup Winners' Cup, the European Cup, plus the European Super Cup and Intercontinental Cup. These sit alongside his playing honours for Milan: two Serie A titles, a Uefa Cup Winners' Cup and two European Cups, plus an Intercontinental Cup.

Fabio Capello, who played against Trapattoni, says: "He won titles in Italy with Juventus [six] and Internazionale [one], he won the title with Benfica, Bayern Munich, with [Red Bull] Salzburg. It's not easy to win in every country. Trapattoni ensures he knows well the teams, the players, the spirit of the country. And he pushes his spirit into the team."

Capello is "absolutely not" surprised that after failing to qualify for the last World Cup – Thierry Henry's handball set up what proved to be the decisive goal in the 2-1 aggregate play-off defeat to France – Ireland are at the Euros, "because he is a winner".

Trapattoni began his managerial career at Milan in 1974. He left two years later for a golden decade at Juventus in which he took the club to a first continental success – the Uefa Cup in 1977 –and won every major domestic and European honour. Trapattoni departed in 1986 for five years at Inter that featured his last scudetto (in 1989) and the 2-1 aggregate Uefa Cup triumph over Roma in 1991 with the side of Klinsmann, Brehme and Matthäus. After leaving Inter in 1994, single seasons at Bayern Munich and Cagliari preceded a return to the Bavarian club for two campaigns that closed with the Bundesliga plus the German cup and league cup added to his trophy collection.

At Fiorentina – 1998-2000 – Trapattoni took the club into the Champions League, before the disappointing spell leading his country. Italy were controversially knocked out of the 2002 World Cup by South Korea to a golden goal after the referee Byron Moreno sent off Francesco Totti and ruled Damiano Tommasi's legitimate strike offside: all of which caused Trapattoni (and Italy) to mutter about conspiracies.

A deeply religious man, he was lampooned in his homeland for throwing holy water on the dugout during his unsuccessful tenure with Italy, a custom he continues with the Irish.

After elimination from Euro 2004 at the group stage Trapattoni, by then 65, illustrated his tireless spirit by leading Benfica to a first Portuguese championship in 11 years in his only season there. Ricardo Rocha, the former Tottenham Hotspur defender, says: "He was the biggest reason we won the league. He is a character – can speak so many languages, German, English, Italian, Spanish, that sometimes he uses them all together."

The Irish media have dubbed his sometimes confusing dispatches to them "Trappish". And while he showed a ruthless streak last week by leaving out Kevin Foley from his Euro 2012 squad, despite the player protesting he had recovered from injury, there is no suggestion that Trapattoni will slow down, despite health scares in August 2010 and last January, when he required surgery.

Rocha adds: "When he left Benfica in 2005 he said: 'I need to go to Italy because my family needs me.' But he couldn't stay away from football and he went to Germany again [to Stuttgart]. Football is in his blood. You take away football, you take away his life.'"